Page:St. Nicholas - Volume 41, Part 1.djvu/276

250 seeing it emerge before long, to his regret it did not reappear. “It went,” he thought, “to some house that I cannot see.”

But presently, to his satisfaction, he noticed the horse’s head and the upper part of the carriage coming diagonally up the hill. “I ’ve learned a new road,” he thought.

There were two persons in the carriage; not women, certainly. He narrowed his eyes. “Men! And one is citified.” One of them was, indeed, wearing a stiff straw hat and a tall white collar.

Then the carriage turned, and came quartering up the hill in a different direction. The truth came to him at once: “The road zigzags, and they ’re coming here!”

He looked about him as if for escape; he thought of calling Nate. As if brought by sympathy, Nate came out and looked at him. “All right?” he asked. He saw in the boy’s face what others had already noted there, the hunted look, the desperation mingled with appeal. “Why, what ’s wrong?”

“That carriage is coming here!”

Nate looked down the hill. “Sure enough, it is.” ’

“It ’s some one after me!” cried Rodman.

“After you?” asked Nate, looking at him narrowly. The boy was white. Nate put his hand on his shoulder. “It’s only visitors. Friends of mine.”

“One of them is from the city,” insisted Rodman. His breath was coming quickly, and he began to try to rise.

“Surely,” answered Nate. “But ye need n’t be afraid of him. It ’s Brian Dodd, and if he is rather citified in his dress, it don’t mean nothin’, He ain’t half so smart as his cousin Pelham, that comes with him.”

Rodman sank back. “Oh, that ’s who they are?”’

Nate nodded. “Pelham ’s sixteen; jes’ about your age. His father was here the other day; he owns the mills. The other feller, he ’s out of New York. Half a year older, maybe. Stayin’ here for the summer.”

Rodman looked again at the approaching travelers. Now that they were nearer, he saw clearly that they were boys.

“If you don’t feel up to seein’ em,” said Nate, “I’ll send ’em back. But if T was you, I ’d see ‘em. It ain’t no disgrace to be sick, not as I ’ve learned yet. An’ perhaps the visit ’ll set you up.”

Rodman appeared to pull himself together. “All right,” he said. “Tell me what they ’re like.”

“Pelham, he ’s all right,” answered Nate. “That city chap—well, you can jedge as well as I. I ain’t seen much of him.” Nate went again into the house.

Presently, coming around the corner of the house, the two boys approached on foot. Pelham came first, with an eager and interested look. He went straight to the invalid and held out his hand. “I ’m Pelham Dodd,” he explained. “My father told me that perhaps you ’d like company. So I came with my cousin. Brian, this is—"’

He paused, embarrassed. The lad spoke for himself. “Nate is going to call me Rodman.”

“Rodman, then,” said Pelham, relieved. “This is my cousin Brian.”

With elaborate ease Brian shook Rodman’s hand. He was a little taller than Pelham, a little softer and slower. He dressed in an older fashion, as Rodman had already seen at a distance; he had more of a manner, and spoke as to a younger boy, saying, “Sorry you ’re ill.” He went and leaned against a near-by tree.

In justice to Brian, it must be considered that the meeting was a difficult one. He and Pelham had been carefully instructed not to question Rodiman about his past; they were not to suggest that they had met him before, they were simply to take him for granted. All this was not easy, especially when both the boys had been full of their knowledge concerning the lad, of curiosity to know whether he was the boy of the railroad story, and when now at first glance they recognized him.

Pelham threw himself into the breach. Plumping down on the grass beside the invalid, he began to talk. “Nice place this, up here. Good view, is n’t it?”

“Very good,” agreed Rodman.

“Lots of times I ’ve sat here with Nate and the boys,” went on Pelham. “If ever we chaps are out in the woods, we usually try to come home by Nate’s, so as to spend half an hour here, talking with him. Best view in the town, I think, and best man to talk to. Don’t you like his stories?”

Rodman smiled and shook his head. “I ’ve not heard any yet, but I ’ll make him tell me some.”

“It ’’s worth it,” said Pelham. “And, see here—if you say, I ’ll bring the whole gang up here to see you on Saturday morning. You ought to know them.”

Rodman smiled. “Thanks.”

“We play ball that afternoon,” explained Pelham. “Perhaps you could get down to see us.”

“Perhaps,” agreed Rodman.

“And later you can play with us,” Pelham went on, warming with enthusiasm. “We have a match every Saturday, when we can arrange it. Any fellow can get a place on the nine who plays well enough. You do play, of course?”